'Good Wife' legal cases are on the rise in UK as reforms prompt rise in group actions

Friday 31 January 2014 10:37 BST

US import: Julianna Margulies stars as lawyer Alicia Florrick in The Good Wife

Lawyers fear the US legal system’s trigger-happy litigation is making inroads in this country.

Although US-style class actions are not currently permitted under UK law, recent legal reforms mean very similar actions are available — and these group actions are on the rise.

As a result they fear we could soon see scenes in London’s civil courts that are similar to those in hit US TV series The Good Wife, which returned to Britain for a new series this week. The show’s main character, Alicia Florrick — played by Julianna Margulies — is known as the “Class Action Queen”.

In Britain, group actions enable claimants to club together to sue a company or individual — but they have to opt in if they want to join the claim.

By contrast in the US, class actions apply to a whole category of people with similar interests. Once the class is defined, anyone falling within it would be entitled to a share of any damages awarded even if they did not actively participate in the litigation itself, unless they opt out.

The “no-win-no-fee” deals in the US are widely blamed for giving so-called victims little or nothing to lose from trying it on in court. Though measures were brought in last year to curb the popularity of “no win, no fee” in the UK, alternative funding arrangements are on the rise.

David Allen, head of litigation at Mayer Brown, said: “Even big ticket commercial litigation is going through a revolution in how funding is sought to get it off the ground.”